We will see Palestine freed!

Toespraak van Yuval Gal bij het Rode Lijnprotest van 20 maart bij de PKN.

What an honor to be invited to speak here today. So brave and so good that you are raising this issue inside your communities. Thank you for that! History would remember you!

In these times of fear, war, rise in racism we continue to see a growing group of people standing together against the forces of evil. People of all or no religion, of all colors, languages and backgrounds. When governments world wide worship death and destruction it is upon us to fight for life. And I say people of all or no religion, of all colors, languages and backgrounds but the ones who have been really leading the good fight in recent years had been the Palestinian people. ALL OF THEM! The lawyer pleading his people’s case, the mother struggling to feed her child, the medical personal doing what they can in unbareable circumstances to save life, the ones fleeing and ones staying in place. And yes also the ones taking up arms and fighting.

Let us be perfectly clear: THE PALESTINIAN PEOPLE HAVE A RIGHT TO DEFEND THEMSELVES! A VIOLENT SETTLER COLONY A GENOCIDAL APARTHEID STATE LIKE “ISRAEL” DOES NOT HAVE SUCH RIGHT! AND should not exist from the first place!

Yesterday I heard Nethanyhu says Jesus has no advantage on Genghis Khan. You don’t have to be Christian to understand what he meant. He meant good has no advantage over evil, only brut force is important. Nethanyhu believes tyranny would always win because that is what Zionism teaches. But our Judaism teaches something else.

In a few days we would tell the story of Pesach. A story of a king who thought himself god. Protector of his own kingdom, enslaver of the “others” a king who had sank to the bottom of the sea. Not because his weapons weren’t ten times better than those of his victims but because his victims wouldn’t stop yearning for freedom, dignity and life. A king so obsessed with death, so scared of life, that he had ordered the murder of babies! At the Seder pesach table we will also remember the Erev Rav, the people who weren’t part of bnei Israel but have chosen to go with them. To march towards freedom, to chose their moral compass over their tribal loyalty.

This Pesach we will remember

Without resistance there is no existence! Without revolt there is no life! Without solidarity there is no humanity!

Our commitment to the Palestinian struggle comes from our shared humanity and from our Jewish heritage. Just like before in the land of Egypt, we would walk with and behind our Palestinian comrades. Towards life, towards freedom, and we will see Palestine freed!

From the river to the sea,

Lechayim intifada!